Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Wishy-Washy Washer Woman

One of the fun things about the age Rose is at right now is that the most mundane things by our adult standards are fascinating and even exciting to Rose. We've seen how much she loves banging wooden spoons against pots, but the wooden spoon all by itself is usually entertainment enough. Still, to this day, she starts bouncing up and down when she spies the spoon, which I hang on the side of the kitchen island.

Recently, Rose has discovered the dishwasher. When she sees that it's open, she gets on all fours, puts her head down and makes the long, slippery journey across the kitchen floor, just to touch the white cage that holds the mysterious round green objects. "That's a plate. Plate. Puh-late" (This is how a lot of our conversations go lately.) This makes doing dishes with a baby to entertain a lot easier for me. I no longer have to run back and forth like a mad woman - from the kitchen to load a dish, then the hallway to pluck up my daughter and replace her in my line of sight, then back to the kitchen to load another dish, then to the living room to distract Rose from a tangle of wires, then back to the kitchen...you get the idea.

This morning Rose was helping me with the dishes and I took a moment to take pictures.

First, she sees her target, takes a few crawls into the kitchen, then stops to look back at me. "Are you coming Mom?" Or maybe it's, "I'm headed over there, that cool with you?"

(Yes, one of the hazards of crawling is that the carpet may pull off your socks). I head over to the dishwasher, and she's head down on her journey. It's not as easy as it looks, her little knees want to slide out to the sides on that shiny floor, so her hands are doing most of the work.

When she arrives, she's proud of herself and full of curiosity.

"Are we done already Mom?"

Rose isn't pulling to a stand yet, but she is practicing on anything she can find.

Some of Rose's favorite sounds this week are "ha" (more like a fake laugh than a sound), "ck" and "ish" - she has yet to do ba, da, ma, or pa. But lots of good old "ga" and growling. I think the new sounds come from our conversations at bath time. "That's a fish. Fish. F-ish." "That's a Crab. Crab. Cr-ab". "That's a duck. Duck. D-uck." Rose: "Uck. ck. ck." Oops, maybe I should leave that last one out. Too bad we don't have a beaver bath toy.